Keep reading over the holidays

Here are some ideas

To find out more about these books and other books in the library, click on the ETaunga link (scroll down in this blog and look to the right of the page). Then look for site links, click on the library - catalogue. Then click on OPAC search. Look at the new items list and the reading lists for ideas.

Congratulations to Mary Fisher

Our wonderful ex student, Mary Fisher has represented New Zealand in paralympic swimming and won four medals to boot! We are sooo sooo proud of Mary. Here's the video of her coming a very close second in the 100m backstroke. We can't find the one of her gold medal win in the 200 medley.

Mary is so inspirational in that she not only swims, but achieves so much in music and is very driven academically.

August Reading Challenge House Competition



 

Library Week

Apirana Taylor

Visited our school on 31 July. He was very exciting and the students who saw him couldn't believe a poet could be so entertaining. His incorporation of Te Reo and traditional Maori instruments added to the performance.

Quiz

We had a record number of teams this year - ten in total and competitiveness was very high. The winning team was made up a group of year 12 girls - Katherine Tuck, Kiriana Tahana, Emma Groombridge and Haylee Groenveld.

Olympic Reading challenge

Tell us what books you've read in August to get house points. The books must be titles that we hold in the library.

Meeting the author

We've just had two fantastic opportunities to meet two amazing authors.

On Wednesday we had Mandy Hager visit our school. She is a New Zealand author and has written Run for the trees, Smashed, The blood of the lamb trilogy and recently The nature of Ash. All of which are absorbing teenage novels of quite different genres. My personal favourite is The blood of the lamb trilogy which is a dystopian fiction that has strong racism and human rights themes. All of her books include social issues, but are fast paced with lots of action.

Then on Thursday a small group of us were very lucky to be able to go to Hutt International Boy's School to see Chris Paolini - author of the Inheritence series. He was a very engaging speaker.

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

I've just read this fantastic book about a boy with a terrible facial abnormality. Auggie wants to be ordinary, but it's impossible for him to live an ordinary life when everyone notices his abnormality before they find out what he's like as a person. I loved this book because Auggie is such a strong character and the people whos lives he touches also add their perspective. I recommend that everyone reads this book. It will help you to be more accepting of others. Also watch the author interview to find out her inspiration for the story.

New library books

In a recent survey you told us that you want us to buy more new books. You'll be pleased to know that we've just bought many new titles. Here are just some of them. Don't forget to ask for anything that  you would like us to buy by using the suggestions for purchase form at the issues desk or clicking on the page link to suggestions for purchase on this blog.

To see all the new books, check out the list on the library OPAC. You can access the OPAC in several ways.

From a library computer just login and open Internet Explorer - the library home page will automatically come up. Click on OPAC search from here.

From a computer eslewhere in the school. Open ETaunga and click on the link that says HC library page.

From a computer outside the school. Google ETaunga and open the student portal. You will have to sign in at this stage with your school login. Click on School library catalogue link.